Sailor Soldier of Love and Justice

Last week I made a trip to NY. Ben was out of town and my mother had been bugging me for a visit for a while. I got to see my friends a good couple of times, so it all went very well.

The drive down on Thursday was pretty smooth. I didn't hot real traffic until I got to NY, and even then I got to my parents' house before they did. While we waited, Maggie got to see her first train. (My parents live next to the train tracks.) She waited the rest of the time from the safety of the car.

On Friday, I went with my mother to Williamsburg Brooklyn (hipster capitol of the world) to visit my great aunt. When I was a kid, the neighborhood was entirely polish families. It's so different now!

We got there a little early and my great aunt was still getting her hair done, so we made an adventure to find stroopwafels. The first shop (which, bizarrely, was right next to where my great grandma's old candy shop used to be) was all out, but they suggested a cheese shop a block or so down that usually carries them.They did indeed have them, and I nearly died buying them. The place smelled horrific. Too much cheese! And the woman working the register was telling a couple where to find every single pizza shop in the area. The wait was awful.

But I got my stroopwafels! And they were quite tasty! Not so tasty that I'd make a trip just for them, but it was worth it since I was in the neighborhood.

After that, we ate lunch with my great aunt at one of the remaining polish restaurants in the area. She happily told my mother all the gossip in the neighborhood and then we went back to her apartment where she gave us random cans of food to take home.

The drive back to my parents' house was terrible. It was raining so the traffic took 2.5 hours. With my mother. Alone in a car. Not fun.

But the evening went better. I met up with all my friends at a local pirate restaurant. We had a ton of fun even if the pirate theming was a little weak. And then we went back to amanda's house and played board games and ate stroopwafels until it got late. I am a terrible, smug winner.

Saturday we had a bbq at the house and all my friends were invited. Everyone who could make it did and good times were had by all. I even went into the pool. Then got out because I was FREEZING! But I did manage to go in up to my shoulders, so it counts!

On Sunday, my parents and I took Maggie out on the boat. She did not enjoy it as much as I hoped, but I think she was just scared of the newness. By the end, she was fairly calm. She even hammed it up a bit for the camera.


My mom caught the first non-sea robin fish. My dad caught the biggest non-sea robin fish. Both had to be thrown back because they were too small. I didn't fish at all. Instead I just enjoyed being out on the water. I hate beaches but love boats.

I pretty much passed out when I got back to the house. It was crazy. I was pretty much dead for 3 hours. My parents finally woke me for dinner and then after I went to tara's for more fun board games.

Monday was a good day to leave. I was exhausted physically and I hadn't yet exhausted my welcome. Or at least I thought it was a good day until the verrazano bridge shut down. A man tried to jump from the bridge so the entire upper deck was closed down to talk him out of it. All well and good for him but for me, traffic was backed up for MILES. Everyone had to take the lower deck, which scares me because if something happens, the bridge might crush me. (The stupid things I worry about.) But once I got around that, it was smooth all the way down to VA. It took 2 hours to get from my parents house to NJ. But compare that to the drive back from brooklyn on friday and it was nothing!

My dogs were very happy to be back home. They ran around in the yard and sniffed all their favorite things. Then cuddled in my bed. I guess they are not road trip dogs.

Today we visited the cradle of aviation and cloud 9 yachts.

As soon as I stepped into the cradle of aviation, I wanted to cry. It's perfect. It's better than in the pictures. It's exactly what I want.

The new guy is a significant improvement over the old guy. He gave me a tour of the place and explained a lot of stuff the other guy refused to. While on the tour, I realized though that I will need to rent two rooms rather than one.

Plan:
- Have ceremony in red planet cafe
- Go into space hall for cocktail hour while red planet cafe is converted to dinner tables
- Have dinner back in red planet cafe

That's another $1,500! Sad! So expensive! But so perfect! Curse you, pretty museum of shiny things!!!!

After that, the yacht was not nearly as impressive. It was nice, but for the price, it wasn't really worth it. Plus the docking fee was astronomically higher than I thought it would be. Like more than 4 times higher.

The "best" part of the yacht was when it had drifted from the dock a little while we were on it, so we had to leap to the dock. Scary!

It was about rush hour at that point so we stopped at my aunt leona's house in brooklyn to wait. She's the one who always gives me hello kitty stuff.

She took us out to a polish restaurant. I had vegetarian chili and some pirogis. Then we went back to her place where I played with some of her kittens. She's a crazy cat lady, so she has about 8 cats in the house, and who knows how many she feeds outside. The kitten actually came from outside, so it doesn't know how to play with people yet. I taught it how to chase string. It spent the rest of the evening attacking anyone who wiggled their fingers too much.

Aunt leona sent me home with a bag full of candy, the way my great grandma used to do. She also tried to give me a new purse. However, she would not let me take the kitten. :(

Back at my parents house now. Ben is being unhelpful by encouraging me to have the wedding at the place I like. There goes my budget!

I am in NY. It is very cold here.

Ben was sweet and got up at the crack of dawn to take me to the train station. (Well, 8am, but that is close to the crack of dawn for a guy that normally gets up at noon.) Getting to the bus stop after that was really easy. It was right outside metro center with a big helpful sign.

My bus was not marked with the name of the company, so I was a little confused at first. Luckily that was the worst part of the bus trip. It was mostly college students and twenty somethings--all people who understand the benefits of quiet and hygiene. Everyone either slept or texted or listened to music. And no one smelled like urine.

We hit some traffic in Delaware, but we made back the time in NJ. I slept through most of it. We got to Penn Station right on time.

I had just missed the train home, so I used the hour I had to kill by grabbing lunch and window shopping.

I mildly embarrassed myself when the train did arrive by dropping my suitcase at the top of the escalator when I had already started going down. I had to run up to grab it.

I am always surprised that the LIRR still uses such an antiquated ticketing system. You still need to present them to an employee who punches holes in them. Every other mass transit system I can think of just uses a flat fare or uses automated gates to register where you enter and exit.

Which is a long way of saying I really annoyed the employee who needed to punch my ticket because I had fallen asleep without taking my ticket out and putting it where she could get it.

I didn't sleep long though. Because a baby started to cry and would not stop. When I left, the baby was still on the train crying. I feel bad for the passengers that were still stuck listening to it.

After my parents picked me up, we got chinese food! Good tasty ny chinese food! It was wonderful. Mom bought a lot, so I'm going to eat it for the rest of this trip. You have no idea how bad chinese food is in va.

Despite doing mostly sitting and sleeping today, I am really exhausted. I might go to bed early tonight.

The drive to new york was painfully long. There was traffic almost the entire way. And I got a really bad tummy ache at one point in that traffic. I was so happy when I finally came across a rest stop.

People were driving crazy. I got cut off twice by the same taxi! And more than several people tried to merge into my side. Oh, and my dog went into heat halfway through the ride. I was exhausted when I finally got to my parent's house, but I had to clean my bloodsoaked seats before I could rest.

My grandpa isn't looking good at all. He seemed very confused by everything I was saying and I couldn't understand him very well. He looks very thin and week. The doctors say he could go any day now. :(

It all frustrates me because there's nothing I can do to help. So I'm trapped in this house full of horrible relatives. I hope my grandpa understands things enough to know I'm here. Otherwise this trip was a big waste of time. I would have rather remembered my grandpa as his strong, cranky self than his sick sad self.

Both my aunt stacy and aunt kara tried to cause fights with me today already. I told my aunt stacy that I knew she was trying to make me angry but she should give it a rest because I'm too hungry to care what she says. And I told my aunt kara that the pink object in question (because I am not allowed to change my opinions on colors, ever) was a gift and I saw no reason to throw away a free bag.

They've also already gone through my luggage. Next time, my luggage will have locks on them.

I want to go home. I miss ben. I'm lonely in a house overflowing with people.

Next time we do this trip, we leave far earlier. Either that or we develop a car that can fly.

We left around 11, after mom gave us practically everything in the house that was edible. We hit nasty traffic so it took us two hours to get out of new york. We hit traffic on the goethels bridge that was so bad, I parked my car. It was insane.

After that, traffic moved really well. I got to nearly the end of new jersey before I finally had to stop to get gas. I must compliment the new jersey turnpike people. After driving in the car all day and being all nasty and sweaty and horrible, it was REALLY nice to find a bathroom that was so clean it even smelled nice. There were even flowers by the sinks. I felt almost civilized.

Things continued going well until we got to DC. Just as we were on 495, leaving dc, we hit rush hour. Took us over an hour to go about 10 miles. It made me so sad. I was hot and ben was miserable and it was all such horrible doom with no air conditioning. I could never sit in traffic like that every day. It was horrible. I don't know how people do it.

When we got home, we had the most wonderful pint of ice cream ever. It was cold and yummy and perfect. After that break, we brought all my stuff into the apartment. I own far too much stuff. That's all I've got to say on that.

After a nap and a shower, I feel a bit like a real person again. Though I'm kinda sore and really sunburned and not ready to start work tomorrow. I am going to go to bed soon though. Today was a very long day.

I am in ny. Until Tuesday. I am very very tired from driving. There was no traffic until ny, and then it was traffic almost all the way here.

Blarg... My brain has fallen out. I'm going to poke it with a stick.